It emerged yesterday that Ms Proudman made her “repugnant world” comments in a blog post before the current furore.

Writing on the left-wing website Left Foot Forward, she said she was a campaigner for feminism, not equality.

She wrote: "Men live and work in a brutal society, which is maintained through stratified social order based on ritual humiliation, gentleman's clubs, fights, rites of passage, sexism and banter.

"When women enter the male realm .. they find themselves in a repugnant world in which their only means of survival is by undergoing a fundamental transformation leaving them with little opportunity to make any change."